We all know that our cars need regular servicing, in order to keep running well.

It’s time for your muse to get put up on the lift and given his/her 50,000 mile tune up. Anything stuck? Need to change some filters? Have you worn out the brakes? How’s the engine? Purring like a kitten or sputtering?

Physically. Emotionally. Communities. Storylines. Take a good, hard, critical look at your muse, both as an independent entity and where they are in their game, and evaluate what needs to be tuned up.

As a matter of fact, yes. There are some things with Fanny that I definitely need to adjust and tweak. This comes at a time when she is on the verge of actually getting written in book form. I’ve spent so many years on her, the realisation has come that it is just time to put it in order, make an outline, add the pertinent things that make her who she is – particularly the magickal aspects of who she is and just go with it.

Physically. Emotionally. Communities. Storylines. Take a good, hard, critical look at your muse, both as an independent entity and where they are in their game, and evaluate what needs to be tuned up.

I think it really hit home last week when Fanny / Faelyn responded to a post that her husband had made and she was just so imperious with him. She essentially called him out and treated him like a Courtier – which of course, he is – but he is more than that. He is also her Prince Consort, and her husband and I think the ball-busting way in which she confronted him was probably a real misinterpretation of who Fanny actuallyIS by myself. In other words, I think I inserted too much of who I am as a person or writer into who she is, and that isn’t being true to the Muse. She never would have publicly called him out – never. So, we sort of put the vehicle in reverse and renegotiated that particular stretch of road.

Physically, that is a little harder since Fanny is an Immortal. I think I need to show her being far more physical than I have as of late – but certainly in a little less sexually focused context. (She gets plenty of that!) It is hard to explain to those who have non-Fae muses that the Sidhe are extremely sexual in just about everything they do. There are seven s’s that any woman who is French and any woman who is Sidhe must abide by. She must be Slender, she must have a certain Savoir-Faire, she must understand and practice the art of Subtlety, she must have what we now call Street Sense. At her base, she must always exude Self-Confidence. She must know quite well the role that her Sexuality plays in her life. And lastly and above all things and at all times she must always possess at the very core of her being, a certain Sensuality. Sensuality is at the very heart of Since Fanny / Faelyn falls under both realms at the same time, and so do her daughters, Caroline and Jocelyn these things I have to always keep in mind. Even when writing Jocelyn, the youngest, I have to keep those things in mind and also when I go back to Faelyn’s backstory, I will have to keep those things right there. Truthfully, I think as with most writers of a main character, we don’t tend to follow a timeline in a linear fashion. We tend to go where the muse takes us. And with characters who are Fae, who the hell knows where you are going to end up or maybe I should say, “when you are going to end up.”

Emotionally, I go where Herself tells me to go. Sometimes we explore extreme sadness, sometimes the most intense and profound love, other times we go in places where I have never seen, felt or experienced such rage in my own life. I don’t believe that the Fae do anything half way, and the other half of her is Scottish, which of course can be quite mercurial as well. Then you have the whole interaction with her husband’s culture and it can be quite the rollercoaster ride.

As far as communities go, I have been a member of so many since I got on the Internet way back in 1995. I have been a part of many over those years, both on LJ and off and am part owner of another that manages to sustain itself with a good sized number of members Over that period of time I have become very picky about where I allow Fanny or the other inhabitants of my cranium to enter, and more especially about where I let her and the others continue to play. I think that comes from years of having watched or even at times been swept up in some of the online drama that inevitably occurs. It is at times reminiscent of a locker room brawl or the cliquish and catty behaviours of the high school mean girls (even among the guys!) who are trying out for the lead in the latest school play, and just about as meaningful in the scheme of things! I am far too old to play that sort of thing anymore.

I don’t like comms with activity checks that demand that I post in a certain amount of time. Real life is something that we all face – and while I don’t th ink folks should just go into a community and lurk constantly, I think that if someone does not post after a certain number of months, then someone might say something to them. I know it has happened to me a number of times, and most mods are understanding – some are outright trolls about activity checks, have nothing better to do than to make sure everyone follows the rules to the Nth degree. These deserve to be no less than beaten about the head and shoulders with their own flat screen monitors and keyboards until they get the idea that maybe getting off of the life support system via their DSL or dialup connection might be in order.

The bottom line is that I write to please me. I have a penchant to only write with folks who have a proven track record toward being realistic about life and writing. While that certainly does not mean I will not give someone whom I have never written with before a chance, it really does make me (and my muses) quite cautious about how a storyline is started or progresses. This is never more true than in communities. The most spontaneous threads, however, are most often not because of any specific writing prompt or community but rather the interaction of two or more people and it just evolves from there. Most of the best threads and RP’s go on for the long term. Sometimes these can go on for months – sometimes they even go on for years. ;